Most clinics don’t know what they’re doing and people don’t get results there. What most have isn’t really an indication of anything. The best machines are expensive. The rest are cheaper. Clinics buy what makes sense financially. Then, some companies have better more aggressive sales people. The Soprano seems to fall into that category. They’re selling it as the new best thing on the market, which it doesn’t seem to be so far. But most haven’t used it long enough to know that.
I’ve signed up for soprano laser removal on my stomach and feet. Am I wasting my time and money? What is the best laser?
I don’t think it can be that bad, my clinic said it was more expensive than their GentleLASE but they bought it because GentleLASE is “archaic” since it can only treat one skin type and is painful.
This is a business. Everyone who has X says it’s better than Y. That doesn’t make it true.
It’s misleading and premature to label GentleLASE as archaic when no consistent, long-term evidence of stable hair reduction with Soprano is available. It’s also untrue that GentleLASE can only treat one skin type.
That wasn’t their exact words, they meant basically it’s far more limited in what it can treat, as they can only treat very light skinned people with an alexandrite, anyone with a tan or darker skin can’t be treated with it so it limits who they can have as a customer.
My only point is the Soprano although doesn’t have tons of studies can’t be all that bad. It’s not like it’s some company selling something like the Tria to home users where they’ll use it a bit and most likely stop. If I was opening a business to do laser hair removal I wouldn’t just buy a machine because the company told me to, I’d do research to find out what’s best and look at something else like one of those machines that does alexandrite and yag laser combo. I just find it interesting that SO many companies have Soprano XL, it’s by far the most common laser that I’ve seen at least.
It can also be very area-dependent. Part of the reason you may not be seeing lots of GentleLASE is due to your location. Given there’s more sun exposure (as compared to my area, at least), not a lot of folks will have light enough skin for decent settings, save for the most ‘intimate’ areas. It’s not economical in this case. Still, googling “GentleLASE Miami” brings up tons of hits.
Diodes are very similar in range of skin types they can treat (755 vs 800nm). Soprano attempts to circumvent this by firing successive low fluence pulses. It’s an interesting strategy.
If you do opt to do it, please keep us updated on how it goes.
Please read the FAQs at the link below.
GentleLASE is top of the line. They’re constantly upgrading it anyway. What your clinic is telling you is marketing BS. That’s why we have this forum. We’re not being paid by you and have no incentive in your using one machine over the other. Everyone’s going to tell you whatever they have is best.
Ability to treat all skin types is irrelevant to you - what should be important to you is who has the machine that works best on YOUR skin type. Either way, Soprano is a diode and can’t treat all skin types anyway. Candela that makes GentleLASE also makes GentleMAX which is an alex and a Yag one. Now, that machine can treat any skin type.
Generally, we try to recommend BEST here. If the clinic knows what they’re doing, they’ll get you at least some results on the right type of hair.
In theory alex and yag can catch all skin types but alex is VERY light and yag is VERY dark so you kinda miss in the middle. Having said that, i’m sure many places wouldn’t mind doing that to people with skin type 3-4 just because they want the business, but that applies to probably all machines anyway.
In terms of how much they cost Soprano XL is about 80k and GentleLase is about the same, maybe a little bit more.
The GentleMax i think is selling for about 120k.
Also all the Candela machines have consumables which the Soprano does not.
Skin types III can be treated at good settings on an alex just fine. Skin types IV are the only ones in between and can try either alex, diode, or Yag to see which would be most efficient.